Israel's state comptroller has questioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over lavish private trips abroad he made that were financed by businessmen, the Haaretz newspaper reported on Friday.

It said he was questioned in secret for more than two hours at the start of the week, over an affair which broke out almost a year ago after an investigation by a private television station, Channel 10.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin stopped short of backing Bashar Assad in the Syrian crisis, saying Russia had no special relationship with his regime and refusing to predict that the president would stay in power.

With pressure mounting on Moscow to harden its line against Assad, Putin called on both the Damascus regime and opposition rebels to agree a ceasefire but also criticized the West for backing the rebels in the conflict.

Syrian security forces on Friday killed 75 people across the country and opened fire to disperse demonstrations in the cities of Aleppo and Damascus as thousands took to the streets, activists and monitors said.

The Local Coordination Committees, the main activist group spurring protests on the ground, said among the victims were several children, two women and 14 summarily executed in the flashpoint Homs neighborhood of Baba Amr.

Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron called Friday for the "criminal" Syrian regime to be held to account.

"One day, no matter how long it takes, there will be a day of reckoning for this dreadful regime," Cameron said as he joined European Union leaders on the second day of a two-day summit.

Seven Americans on trial over charges their pro-democracy groups fomented unrest have flown out of Egypt after the U.S. posted nearly $5 million in bail for them and nine others who managed to leave before a travel ban was imposed.

Thursday's departure of the seven eased a deep diplomatic crisis between the U.S. and Egypt that had been building for two months, following a crackdown on pro-democracy and human rights groups by the Egyptian government.

President Barack Obama on Thursday called U.S. support for Israel "sacrosanct," and said he wanted the country to maintain its "military superiority" as he prepares to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The two leaders are expected to make discussions about Iran's nuclear development program a priority during their planned meeting Monday at the White House.

Iran on Friday voted for a new parliament in the first nationwide elections since a bitterly contested 2009 poll that returned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to power, posing a new test of his support among conservatives.

The elections, to fill the 290 seats in parliament, were being boycotted by Iran's main opposition and reformist groups, the leaders of which have been under house arrest for the past year.

Syrian authorities have found the bodies of U.S. journalist Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik in the Baba Amr district of powder keg Homs Thursday after rebels retreated, the foreign ministry said.

"Authorities this morning located the bodies of the two journalists, American Marie Colvin and Frenchman Remi Ochlik, in a great humanitarian effort," a source at the ministry said quoted by SANA news agency. The two had been "buried in the region which was controlled by armed terrorist groups".

Al-Qaida combatants are fighting alongside armed Syrian opposition militants, Russian foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich was quoted Thursday as saying by the Itar-Tass news agency.

"It is not a secret that our proposals are being rejected by the West or blocked by Syria's radical opposition, not to mention armed units fighting against governmental forces that include al-Qaida fighters and other extremists," he said.

Russia on Thursday confirmed it had agreed to discuss its approach to the Syria crisis with critical Gulf foreign ministers, but denied that a firm date had been set for next week.

"We have received the agreement in principle from member states of the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf to organize such a meeting," foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich told ITAR-TASS.